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SR4-SK Welcome
Welcome to Seattle... and the shadows. First off, Look to your left. Look to your right. Now look around you until you see about 10 people who are also new to the shadows. Odds are that in a year, only one of you will still be alive. Yes, it's that rough in the shadows. But you wouldn't be here if you had a choice, or if you were seeking a comfortable life. Now for the details. Assuming you've been living under a rock for the last century, let me give you the quick skinny on corporations. They're ranked by how big and powerful they are, all the way from a AAA globe-spanning corp with a name you can't help but know like Ares or Aztechnology, all the way down to small little local outfits. Just because a company is small and local doesn't mean it's not owned by one of the big boys though, so remember that when you're breaking into a minor research lab for hot tech you might suddenly run across real guards from Ares with serious firepower. AAA Corporations are countries in of themselves without as many of those pesky laws. As in you can be a citizen of England, but you might be better off being a citizen of Neonet instead. That also means that when you're breaking into one of the big boys, you're crossing international lines into a place where the only laws that apply are the laws of the company. Magic, do you know it? it started coming back into the world back around 2010, and since then it's pretty screwed up the world. It's why the native americans got most of the land and the power these days, why if you go to south america there's a solid chance you'll get your heart ripped out on top of a pyramid and why you want to hire a mage to go with you on runs. Ever tried to shoot one of those fire elementals when they appear in front of you? Unless you're packing enough firepower to stop a tank, you can't do a hell of a lot against them, and they're walking flame throwers. It doesn't end there though, because it's not just meta-humans, mages and spirits. Nah, now we have what are called para-critters. animals that can use a bit of magic, typically making them bigger and stronger, but sometimes smarter and more nasty. If you played the old RPGs you'd laugh when your first quest was to go kill a dozen rats. Let me tell you, if you come across a dozen devil-rats today you run for your life because those bastards will kill you. To make it worse, there was also viruses and stuff changed by magic. That's where we get ghouls and vampires and banshees and other nasty stuff that, surprise surprise, will kill you. And eat you. Technology is almost as bad. Security systems, gun packing drones, anyone with the cash to spend can make your day a living hell and if you don't have a hacker with you, your runs will be a LOT more painful. Finally the new guys on the tech scene, technomancers. You all heard the scares last year, and people saying they're brainwashed by AI's into helping them take over the world and all that. They are freaky, there's no denying that. Even to mages that deal with ghosts they're creeepy. They do things to you and your bank accounts that even hackers can't do. That having been said, they're weird, they're freaks and they have unusual abilities... which has Shadowrunner written all over it. Last thing, runs. They will go wrong. You will be betrayed. If you're lucky, you'll survive and get some pay. If you're not, well then you're one of the 90% aren't you? This is the way the game is played, people employ shadowrunners as deniable assets, and that means frequently disposable assets. Your goal is obviously to stay alive and get paid, in that order. This means that if you end up being double-crossed by some high up Ares corp boss, you bend over and take it, because otherwise you are dead. Now on to the topic of the city. If you're new to Seattle, there's a lot going on and lot to avoid. Some of the general highlights, we've recently had a change in the police force. Lone Star lost the contract to police the city, Knight errant got it. Lone Star still has the contracts for the prisons however. What does this mean to you? It means that a bunch of gear from the police has gone missing, having been "mis-filed on inventory" during the hand off. It also means we have a lot of pissed of ex-Lone Star cops working the shadows, always good when you need cheap muscle. It also means that 'Errant is on a quest to "clean up the city", which translates into sticking their noses in where they don't belong and upsetting old arrangements and harassing homeless. There's even been posturing talk about them trying to take out the crime mall, but I'll talk about that later. Now, what are some of the scenic areas you will get to tour? Well, as runners the first thing I highly recommend is getting yourself a map. Get a map of the roads, get a map of the sewers while you're at it, you're going to be spending a LOT of time in the muck. To the south, you'll find the military base. Now doing runs against the military is not unknown, but they're not fun. They have good security, bigger guns than you, and generally get pissed easier than a troll. The highways leading to the base from the city? They're a nightmare. Even the MP's and the cops can't do much against the gang problems there. My advice? If you have to drive on that road, don't do it in your own car, because there's a solid chance you'll be attacked either by one of the regular old gangs, or one of the hacker or wiz gangs that hang out there. To the west of the city is a lovely little island... Called Council Island. Politics. The natives have most of the power in this part of the world, but Seattle doesn't quite belong to them. But they do have that island. It's an embassy of sorts, full of odd magics and stuff of that sort. If you end up making a run there, be advised no matter what you *are* stepping in major politics, and you *will* be up against magical beings. That having been said, they also have one of the best magical treatment hospitals in the world, so if you can afford it and you're a mage that doesn't want the solution of "stick cyberwear in to replace it!" you might want to give it a solid consideration. The general docks areas? Welcome to the home of some of the most psychotic gangers in the city. Lot of smuggling, like any of you are shocked at that. You'll find there's a lot of gangs all over the place, some worse than others. Halloweeners down at the docks are generally so high you can't even talk to them. Other go-gangers ruling the highways? Not too bad, you can at least talk to them. Downtown? What's to say, there's a lot of skyscrapers, money and work. That's one of the things about shadowrunning, if you're not heading down into the sewers you're heading up into office towers. Again, when you're doing a run do the research and figure out who's tail you're twisting. It can save your neck. There's various little walled cities within the cities where the wealthy live and work, again there's a moderate amount of work for our types there but getting past security can be a pain. Again, it's not going to be the typical way through. There's also the latest little plan that the government has for dealing with the homeless. Because the government of Seattle really cares about us, the little folk that just can't find work but gosh darn it keep trying anyway. The latest plan features an old building that used to be called the Renraku arcology. Quick history lesson, A company that doesn't exist anymore created one of the first AIs there, it went nuts and held the building for the better part of a year, torturing and killing the residents. Huge building meant to hold hundreds of thousands, with the ground floor layers being shopping malls, and the uppers being residential, office space and all that good stuff that the corporation needed. Even had software and hardware factories and it's own nuke power generators in the basements. It's being turned into the place to be if you're poor.. because you have no choice. You submit an application, and if accepted you get shoved in there where they provide food, clothing and shelter, and a chance to work in the malls selling stuff to others there. Funny thing, nobody's heard of anyone leaving the place, only going in. This is really a minor thing for us runners, but it's a point to avoid. You know how hard you have to work to have a building that NOBODY communicates out of? There's also the Orc Underground. See, back in the old old days when the city was built, it kinda sank a bit and there was a bunch of old streets and building parts left underground. Apparently they started getting used about a century and a half ago by organized criminals and the like. Well, after the whole magic-came-back thing there was a bunch of tunnels and underground stuff that was formed, and it all kind of linked together. It's kind of a city within a city for metahumans that are not really as welcome in society as they should be like orcs and trolls. So like china town. It is however, the place to go if you're a troll looking for a properly tailored suit, and possibly if you want to hide something, or rally a bunch of people against humanis. There's also the big selling point of Seattle. The Barrens. Calling it wastelands is a bit of an understatement. You've got mostly empty lands that has some very nasty stuff in it. Granted, you can sometimes find an abandoned house that you can call your own, and you can set up your own little place there out of the cast off discards of others, but here's the problem: there are more problems then you can shake a stick at. some gangers set up out there, there's ghouls, toxic spirits, even some of the nasty kinds of vampires. The only security is what you bribe the local gangers for or set up yourself. And you just hope that gang doesn't get killed by ghouls. That aside it's not all bad. It has such lovely features as a lot of factories... that ship goods in and out via air, because they have *that* heavy a problem with people jacking the shipments. And the Crime Mall. The Crime Mall is just what it sounds like. Several floors of people selling anything and everything without a damn about the law, mostly because the law is bribed and the mall has more firepower. If you need something in a hurry for a run, you might want to hit up the mall. Just be warned, you'll pay a premium for it if you can find it all. You'll find crime all over the place. To be frank it's easier to break the law and pay a fine or do time if you get caught than it is to obey it. There's the high class neighborhoods of course, where you're required to have you commlink broadcasting fully at all times (it's an criminal offence not to, and I've seen a SWAT style response to it in some neighborhoods) and generally any criminal activity is happening indoors out of the way of prying eyes. Doesn't mean it's not happening, just that when your local drug dealer is a corp kiddie making money on the side, and so are his customers it's all very discrete and polite. And that any work you get should likewise be carried out in a polite and discrete fashion. There's still some middle class areas, the kind where the cops will turn up in maybe 10 minutes if they get called, and that's fairly safe as long as you don't go into the "bad places" such as known BTL dens. These are the areas where the cops stop caring about appearance beyond "we have this under control" and more about making busts that look good on the balance sheets. And then of course there's the majority of the city, where you're stepping over chip heads and your security is likely to come more from regular payments to the local gangs than from your tax dollars to the police. Okay, now onto some advice for new runners. First, before you even do your first run, make sure you got all the gear you need, and you've got some basic caches of stuff around the city. Nothing is more annoying that needing ammo for your gun and discovering that to get it without a bunch of tracking on it you've got to pay 20 nuyen a round. What else do I mean by gear? Well, you remember me mentioning sewers and skyscrapers? Gasmask. You'll want it. You can get one built into any number of "disguise" grade face masks, which is always a plus, and you really don't want to breath the air in some places. Plus of course, tear gas is a pretty standard response to armed hostiles in a building. You'll also want some way of going up and down without using an elevator. Nothing kills a run faster than someone shutting down an elevator you are in, so plan on walking everywhere. Some people swear by gekko tape gloves, and that's fine. Personally I prefer a grapple gun and about a thousand meters of monofiament line. You need special gloves to handle it, but that also means you can rig it up as a monowire tripwire behind you if things are getting ugly. There's an assortment of other stuff that you want even if you don't want to be a B&E specialist. Autopickers are cheap and good, card sequencers are expensive but handy. Personally I always have a glass cutter, portable torch and a magnesium bar or three. Why? most security doors are metal. When a run goes sour and you need to get out in a hurry, it's remarkably effective to weld the door shut while someone cuts open the security glass window and then down the outside you go. Get some different clothes and haircare products. Shocking enough, if you look like a ganger walking down the street of a rich-ass area, you'll be flagged as trouble. Same as wearing an Ares suit that screams "Corp Boy" on the edge of the barrens. You stick out, and you will draw attention. And attention is exactly what you do not want. Finally, get a Docwagon contract. The odds of survival go up if you do. Better a botched run with you in the hospital with a pile of debt than a bunch of corpses. And speaking of blood spraying everywhere, carry a bottle of C2 with you. It's not hard, not expensive and it makes it pretty much impossible to tell you were there from DNA traces. If you have moral objections to cleaning a place that you're supposed to be stealing from, then you can be part of the 90%. Armor can't be overstated. And you know what? Spring for it. Get an undersuit and boosted armor that is custom tailored for you. You can get some cheap-ass armored jacket from the pawn shop and it'll work, but if you want to blend in and survive on the streets you want as much as you can get, and that means get that shit tailor-fit to you. There's several companies that make whole lines of bodysuit armor, then you just put whatever mundane clothes you want on top and blammo, you can take a bullet. Hell, there's even a spray armor for boosting the defenses of your normal outfits if you really want. Now guns and killing people. Here's where things get a bit sticky. You want to be a gun bunny toting some BFG around? Fine. You want to master magic and act like that Tri-Dee show Kombat Karl, the Kombat Mage? Fine. You'll last about a month in the shadows, leaving more work for the rest of us. When you kill a cop, the police are suddenly invested in seeing you brought down. it's bad PR, it's bad for moral and it's bad all around. Beating the crap out of a cop? That's an embarrassment. That's the kind of thing they just want to bury. The same applies to rent-a-cops and other workers on a run, with the added advantage that office workers, cheap security cost less to bribe. if the choice is between bribing someone with a hundred nuyen or shooting them, bribe 'em there's less trouble. if you do have to shoot them, use stunning rounds of some kind. Rubber bullets are common, there are also chemical rounds and stick n' shock. Or ya'know, just punch the guy. My advice to anyone starting running in the shadows? Get to know how to handle automatic weapons. Oh sure, knowing how to handle a pistol is nice, and knowing how to fire a hunting rifle will keep you fed if you are living in the boonies, but let's get real for a moment... when the bullets start flying, you want as many as possible going away from you and towards the bad guys. Even if you don't know how to handle the damned thing, you can at least force others to keep their heads down, which can be gold during a run. Second, if you want something with a big bang "Just in Case", learn the basics of how to handle a heavy weapon and get a grenade launcher. Why you might ask? Glad you asked! They can be made compact. You can load them with chemical or other non-lethal rounds like smoke. Finally you can rig it with a goddamned airburst so it goes off as soon as it reaches the target area. I've lost count of the number of times I've seen razorboys bring a grenade or two just in case, toss them towards some hostiles and then accidentally get in range of the detonation or have the higher-end enemies simply walk out of range. Remember a tossed grenade ain't going off for 3 seconds, and in a combat situations these days of wired reflexes, 3 seconds is a hell of a long time. Personally I generally carry at least 2 clips of chemical stunning speedball rounds, 5 clips of stick and shock, 2 clips of regular old ammo, and if I can swing it a clip of APDS ammo. Stick and Shock ammo is generally your friend in a big way. Not only does it work against people, it can scatter the brains of electronics and drones for a while. Now if you're one of those magical Adept people, or some kind of martial arts melee master, good for you! you can fight silently up close, which is a major advantage in taking people out before others hear. You're good to have around, but it's generally a specialist kind of thing. Now if you're going to be a non-fighter type and want to stay alive when people start shooting at you or trying to stab you? Get at least one flash-pack. You wear it like some kind of bling and set it off when the fighting starts. okay it makes the fight look like a disco with the strobe going off but you're also damned hard to target. Second, get an outfit of some kind that has shock-frills. You'll still be get hit with that club, but at least you'll shock the bastard that did it. On a final point, and I'm mostly looking at you trolls and orcs when I make it... armor doesn't substitute for the ability to not get shot in the first place. Most of the rent-a-cops won't be shooting bullets at you, they'll be using stick-n-shock ammo, because it's more effective. Why is it more effective? Because it ignores a lot of that armor you like. General guideline for every little bit less you have in reaction, you're going to need three to six times that little bit in your ability to take a bullet. mechanics: Don't skimp on Reaction, especially to boost armor/body Okay, you remember me talking about basic caches around the city a minute ago? Right, that's because you're going to get screwed over and end up being hunted. Personally I don't work in a city unless I have at least a dozen different places that I've got some clothes and money hidden. It doesn't have to be a lot, just enough that you can stop the bleeding, and hole up in a coffin hotel for a while. For that same reason, I recommend getting several decent fake SINs. Better still is to get in good with some hackers that can make *and* burn them in exchange for some favors. On that point, one thing that a lot of shadowrunners tend to forget... licenses. Let's face it, we're going to be walking around with a lot of restricted gear. Cops will stop you now and then, it happens. You can bribe 'em, or you can have proper licenses tied to your SIN for all your shit in which case they thank you for being a war hero or whatever you put down on your SIN and you're on your merry way. Commlinks. Everyone's got 'em. They store all our personal data, and thus are the single most identity linked piece of equipment you own, hence traceable. So what do you do about this? There's a couple options. Be a hacker or good friends with one and keep having your account rotated and all that spoofing crap. That's a fine idea, but it's a lot of upkeep and possibly favors owed. You can also go the simple route and just buy the disposables. They cost you 300 nuyen a pop, are pre-paid and you'll see about a week to a month's use outta 'em depending on the runs you do. You can easily get open source software that'll run on 'em. The only drawback is that they're crap. the hardware's a couple generations behind, but if you're the kind of person that only uses it for basic entertainment and searches and doesn't get into hacking or keep sensitive info on it (you're not stupid enough to keep sensitive information on your commlink are you?) they work fairly well. Transport is a touchy subject. See thanks to the teeming masses of poor people in the city, we've finally progressed to the point where we have an effective public transit system... and I do highly recommend you memorize the schedules and find out the details about various routes that are not on schedules, like when a line runs early or late. Most of the day transit will get you where you want to go without issue, and cheaply. If you're not on a run but are in a hurry, there's whole fleets of cabs willing to transport you. If you are on a run, there's also the Z-Zone taxis, with the most crazy drivers willing to do anything and not talk about it. I've had pickups outside of AAA corps and drop offs in the barrens and these guys don't bat an eye. They do charge a LOT however. There's also owning your own vehicle. But there's a catch with that. Legally owning a vehicle? Not only does it help identify you, it's tied to your SIN... as in that thing that you're going to be throwing away on a regular basis. Personally I'll use an old beat up vehicle that's got a scattered registration thanks to a hacker friend that I use in the barrens and outskirts and if I need transport other than a cab on a run, I just make sure I've got a hacker or rigger with me and steal a car on the way. Finally since I could feel your hackles go up at the thought of casual car theft and how traceable it can be, let me talk about RFID chips. Now I'm fairly certain that all of you have been to a stuffer shack in the last couple days to grab a quick meal. It works, the food is mostly edible and the candy bar selection can't be beat. However all that processed food? It has RFID tags. in the wrapper. In the food. so does your clothes, so does pretty much everything you own. Nothing can blow a sneaky run faster than a guard wondering why someone who's supposed to be an Ares Corporate Citizen has been stuffing himself with food from the competitors. So some runners say "screw it, use a tag eraser on everything!" That has it's downsides too. Nothing says "shadowrunner!" to cops like someone who is suspiciously lacking in all tracking. My recommendation? leave the tags on your clothes, it's hard to track by those and as something outside of you, you can switch out... you're not going to claim to be an Ares citizen while wearing a Neonet shirt are you? As for the stuff inside, eat organic. It costs more, but it means you're not stuffed full of electronics. On that note, Cyberware. It's great, gives you power, gives you speed, and is a hacker's wet dream. By default a low level wireless signal exists for your cyberwear. it's only good out to about 5 meters or so, but that's more than enough for a hacker to break into your Personal Area Network and do things like shut down your eyes or legs. It can also be turned off. You don't want to leave it off, since diagnostics are needed, updates are needed and all that, but you might want to leave it off except for a window each day or week. Play it safe, fighting blind is no fun. One final point. Life is cheap. Cyberware is expensive, as is everything else. If someone does die, make sure it can't be traced to you and make sure you take and resell what you can. Often on a run the profit is made not from the job, but from selling off the stuff that you acquire on the job. Take out a street sam crammed full of cyberware? You're not going to get top dollar, but you can frequently get enough in resale to make a fortune. Even the body can be sold to a chop shop for a few hundred cred, and then you're helping to save lives from organ transplants. Now some meta-game advice. Perception is a very good skill to have, and very cheap/easy to boost with glasses or cyberware. Dodge however, is not. You burn a turn to use it, which means while you might be getting shot less, there's no chance for you to shoot back. It makes sense if you're making an absolutely non-combat character but otherwise, no. Cars are self-driving for the basics, and even with drive at 0, you have a licence and can handle the basics. Same with not having computer skills, you can still pull up google and type in "how do I break into Ares?" and get results. medicine is good for long term care, but to be frank most people are going to be more interested in First Aid, since that helps in a time scale that works with runs. the Athletics skillgroup is cool, but of limited use in most runs. Running faster than the people around you (leaving them to the lions) is bad form, and unless the whole team is athletic swimmers you're going to be getting issues with needing gear anyway. Skillgroups in general: Look at them and determine if there are at least 2 skills that you want and are going to use, if not, then it's not worth it to buy as a group. Since you can easily get tailored armor up to Body x 3, and there's a number of stacking armor that you wear under your clothes, as well as improving clothes themselves, there is no reason NOT to max out your armor for the few grand it costs. Buy a LOT of ammo at character creation, as well as any other consumables you want. They are annoyingly difficult and expensive to get in-game, frequently taking weeks. If I can swing it, I hope to get a reloading bench and some chemistry skills and enchanting and such for my character to help reduce this headache. It'll still cost a lot, but at least it means you're not waiting a fortnight to buy 100 rounds, or enough material to bind a force 3 spirit. Category:Shadowrun